Return of the Black Pearl: Over the Blood-dark Sea
by SelkieShore
Summary: "Drink. Join us. I'm talking about immortality, Jack - the chance to sail the midnight seas forever." Blood welled, rich and darkly promising from two neat puncture wounds below the black silk cuff. "The chance to be the Vampire Captain Sparrow." AU, follows Curse of the Black Pearl. Rated for no worse violence than you'd expect and because Jack will keep swearing...
1. Chapter 1

_This is an AU, set two years after the events of "Curse of the _Black Pearl_". None of the sequels happened, or are going to. Will and Elizabeth are married, and have not seen Jack since he escaped the gallows in Port Royal..._

**oOo**

Sunlight danced on the water beneath the _Dauntless_' stern, throwing golden reflections up through the thick glass in the cabin windows to ripple like music across the underside of the deck above. For a moment, Elizabeth lay contentedly half-awake, watching it. Then a seagull cried close at hand, and she swung her legs over the side of the bunk, and began to dress in a hurry without calling her maid.

Will, of course, was already up. In the year and a half that they had been married, Elizabeth had never once known him to neglect his daily sword practice. But just recently, ever since they had set sail from Port Royal aboard the _Dauntless_, she thought he had been taking it more seriously than ever. Normally at this hour, if she had stopped to listen, she would have heard the steady thump of his feet overhead, back and forth across the deck in a series of near-perfect fencing lunges, while the crew found excuses to stop what they were doing and watch.

This morning was different. When she had scrambled into the boy's waistcoat and breeches which she wore aboard ship, and padded barefoot on deck tying up her hair as she went with a red silk scarf, she found Will standing quietly at the quarterdeck rail. The beautiful sword was back in its scabbard on his left hip, and his eyes were fixed on something far ahead.

Beside him, Captain Stanbury stood squarely with his fat legs in their white stocking planted wide apart, swaying at ease with the ship as he trained a long telescope on the horizon. Most of the ship's company seemed to be hanging over the side, shading their eyes from the sun with work-hardened hands, and placing bets.

"Four hills in a row," Stanbury was saying. He closed the telescope with a satisfied _snap!_ and turned to the young officer of the watch, who was hovering beside the wheel looking nervous - and slightly pink beneath his sun-tan, as he often did when Elizabeth was on deck. "Enter it in the log, Mr Kenton, and get those men back to work. Good morning, ma'am."

Elizabeth smiled at him, and crossed to Will, who beamed. For a moment only, his delight at seeing her hid the worry in his brown eyes. "I heard seagulls," she said. "Are we near land?"

For answer, Will pointed ahead. Far away, faint in the misty line where sea met sky, was the loom of something darker, like a cloud. "The Captain thinks we should be there by tonight," he told her. "If the wind holds."

Stanbury had handed his telescope to a small midshipman, but Elizabeth whirled, snatched it from the boy's startled grasp, and was up into the rigging like a monkey. Heedless of the strong seas surging just below her, she leaned almost straight out over the ship's side, holding on precariously with one hand while the telescope waved crazily in the other - pointing at everything except the approaching island.

Will sighed. Hauling her back down to the deck, he put his hands on her shoulders and turned her gently but firmly in the right direction. Elizabeth leaned back against his chest, smiling as the island slid into view - and they stood together in the sunlight, watching the four hills rise steadily out of the morning.

"Well, there it is," Elizabeth said. "Ile Quatre-collines. You must admit, it's exciting."

Will's grip on her shoulders tightened. "It's evil," he said. "I won't be happy til we're all sailing safely away from it."

**oOo**

It was just over two weeks since the Governor of Port Royal, that ever-dignified gentleman, had taken a glass or three of brandy more than was good for him before going to bed, and had mistaken a china bowl in the corner of his bedroom for the chamber pot. Unfortunately, what the bowl in fact contained was a large cactus, and the Governor, in the shock of finding out his mistake, had jumped so violently that he blundered through an open window and fell thirty feet into the garden below.

By the time Will and Elizabeth arrived to see him next morning, he was sitting up in bed, nursing a hang-over, a leg broken in two places, and a peevish temper.

"Look at this!" He waved a pasteboard invitation, too quickly for Will to see more than the heavy gold edging and a garish coat-of-arms. "Just arrived on the mail sloop this morning. If I didn't know better I could almost believe El Juez put that dreadful... vegetable there himself, in order to embarrass the Government. I can't possibly go to his Ball now, not in my state of health..."

"El Juez?" Will glanced at Elizabeth, and was relieved to see she looked surprised as well as disapproving.

The man known only as El Juez, "the Judge", was a person of some importance, governor of the island of Quatre-collines. But he was said to owe his position more to bribery and terror than to anything else. He was a tyrant, who kept the island's population in a condition of abject slavery - though even that was nothing to some of the other stories Will had heard about him in the corners of the dockside inns, from hard men who kept their eyes on the door as they spoke.

"Yes, yes, El Juez." The Governor fidgeted uncomfortably on his mountain of pillows, wincing and irritable. "The fellow's holding a ball to celebrate his ten years in power. It really is most inconvenient. It is a social occasion, of course - no politics. But it will _look_ political, you see, if I don't go. It will be interpreted as our not _wanting_ to celebrate his being in power. And they say he does have a most uncertain temper... I shouldn't be at all surprised if the fellow took offence, and refused to sign the Treaty. But he must see I can't travel with this leg. Quite out of the question."

"Treaty?" Elizabeth's eyes flashed dangerously. "You mean you're actually signing a treaty with El Juez? I should have thought we'd do better to declare war on him!"

"Elizabeth, don't be childish. You're a grown woman, now. It is hardly ladylike to express an opinion on such a subject. Especially when your opinions, my dear, really are most exceedingly ill-informed." He waggled a finger at her. "I don't deny that El Juez has something of a - I think we might call it, a _ruthless_ reputation. But he is one of the most powerful men in the Caribbean - the richest, too - and we need him on our side, you see, to stamp out the pirates."

Will had laid a hand warningly on his wife's sleeve. Now he spoke in his most reasonable voice. "Sir, many people believe El Juez is a pirate himself."

"Now, really, William!" The Governor looked huffy, pink as one of the newly-discovered American turkey-birds in his ruffled night-shirt. Then he made an effort, crumpling his face into something he possibly thought of as a fatherly smile.

The real problem was Will.

Little though he had liked the idea of his daughter marrying the blacksmith - even one who was also the finest swordsmith in the Americas - Elizabeth's father did, in fact, love her very much; and he had agreed to the match in the light of her radiant happiness. The boy was honest, brave and, usually, well-mannered. And, of course, for all that fear had clouded the Governor's memory of the details - there was that simply dreadful business of his having rescued Elizabeth from horrible death at the hands of those accursed villains aboard the _Black Pearl_.

He was at home in any company, too. Since his marriage to the Governor's daughter, most of Port Royal's upper classes seemed happy to forget that this same, handsome man had once been a starveling boy, fished from the sea in rags, that he had been brought up the bond-servant of their drunken smith, and that his father had been a notorious pirate, famous all over the Caribbean for having been dragged to his death in a thousand fathoms with a cannon tied to his boots.

At least, they pretended to have forgotten. El Juez would not even pretend.

"You really should take care whom you call a pirate, William," the Governor scolded kindly. "You haven't always been so careful in your own dealings with those sea-scum. I intend to send you and Elizabeth to El Juez' ball in my place. But you must understand this: Your - oh dear, please don't take offence, William - your humble background may itself be taken as an insult by El Juez. I really must insist you do not insult him further with ill-advised remarks. This Treaty is exceedingly important - "

"You can't do that!" Will was on his feet. Beside him, a furious Elizabeth was drawing breath for a shrill explosion on her husband's behalf. But Will himself looked almost afraid.

"Sir - please. I'll go if you order it. But you can't send Elizabeth. Quatre-collines is dangerous. If you had heard one quarter the stories I have... ship-wrecked sailors hanged for daring to be washed ashore there... little children thrown to the sharks because their mothers did not work hard enough in El Juez' slave mines... voodoo magic." Will lowered his voice. "Sir, some people on the waterfront claim El Juez is a vampire."

"Mr Turner, that is enough!" The Governor was angry now. He tugged impatiently at the curtains around his bed, cutting short the conversation by shutting Will out. "I'll - yes, I'll be damned if I listen to more of this nonsense. Of course Elizabeth's going. She is my daughter, it would look most odd if I sent you without her!" He paused, glaring at them both through the gap in the curtains. "People on the waterfront! Those drunkards and fools will believe anything! But it hardly becomes you to do so, William - not in your position. No, indeed it doesn't!"

The Governor drew himself up like someone having the last word. "I'm sure I needn't remind you that "people on the waterfront" believed the crew of the Black Pearl were deathless skeletons, and only showed their true forms by the light of the moon! That's the value of your tavern ghost stories, boy!"

"That was true," Will said bleakly as the curtain whipped into place.

**oOo**

Darkness was falling as a small boat shoved off from the side of His Majesty's Ship _Dauntless_ and rowed steadily across the ink-dark harbour of Quatre-collines.

Above the western horizon, the sky still showed green with the last of the short-lived tropic sunset. But inland, a sickly yellow moon was rising over the shoulder of the heavily forested hill behind the town. Its pale light only made the shadows seem darker. In the harbour, masts and yard-arms threw bars of deeper black across the water.

Elizabeth sat quietly in the stern-sheets, batting at the clouds of night insects which descended on the boat's lantern as they neared the shore. Rich, heady perfumes crowded across the anchorage from the steep-wooded cliffs, and with the sea-breeze gone the heat was oppressive. All the same, Elizabeth shivered.

"What do you think?" Will asked her, his voice low.

"I don't know."

There was something wrong, something unnatural, yet it was hard to say what. Riding lights glittered like fire-flies on the assembled shipping: ramshackle fishing boats, island traders tied up alongside the stone quay, further out the fat merchantmen which had brought El Juez' other guests to the Ball, with here and there the lithe form of a warship like a dragon dozing in the moonlight. There was even a three-decked galleon. Torches showed, too, on the grim fort which dominated the cliff above the harbour entrance, its row of gun-ports grinning like blackened teeth in the bone-white walls. And inland, on the slopes of the hill which formed the head of the long inlet, El Juez' magnificent palace beamed golden at every window.

On the quay itself, a handful of bowed figures were still at work by lantern-light: slaves unloading barrels and crates from a small schooner tied up alongside. Elizabeth watched them with a tightness in her throat. There were slaves in Port Royal too, of course - black and white, sold or kidnapped or, sometimes, sentenced by the law in punishment for some petty crime, to do the back-breaking work no free man could be hired to do, on the plantations. Yet Elizabeth had never seen any human beings as pitiable as these stooped and shuffling wretches. Even the young soldier standing guard on the quayside looked gaunt and hungry in his ghost-white uniform. But the slaves were like skeletons.

Beyond them, at the edge of the pool of light, a coach was standing: a black coach, with black horses wearing black plumes to pull it - and she realised with another touch of cold air on the nape of her neck that this was waiting to carry her and Will to the palace.

But... that was all.

In Tortuga, or even in Port Royal, the whole town would have been ablaze with lights, the glow from open tavern doorways spilling out across the cobbed streets made crowded with cooking smells and drunken laughter. Even the slaves would have been singing, sad and low, to help the rhythm of their work. Here in Quatre-collines the houses stood shuttered and still. The only sound was the ripple of the boat's oars, and the silence waited.

Elizabeth wanted to whisper. So, being Elizabeth, she spoke boldly, her voice clear and unnaturally loud in that pressing stillness. "It's too quiet," she said.

Then the screaming started.


	2. Chapter 2

_Then the screaming started..._

It lasted a minute and felt like a life-time. On and on, low at first but wavering up the scale to a long, shrill shriek which it held till their teeth ached. A hideous, clawing scream which was partly fear and partly pain and somehow more horrible than either - it filled the night, echoing and rebounding from the sloping cliffs. And then, just as suddenly, it stopped.

Elizabeth found she was breathing fast and shallow, her hands trembling violently as they clung to Will's arm. Will himself had half risen, reaching for his sword, and the boat rocked dangerously until he slowly sat down again, the horror and revulsion etched deep on his handsome face. Even the sailors at the oars - as hardened a crew as the _Dauntless_ ever shipped - were muttering and glancing nervously over their shoulders.

But the most dreadful thing was that the slaves on the quayside had paid the scream no attention at all. While that terrible noise howled across the water, they had carried on unloading the little schooner as if a cry from the far slopes of Hell was perfectly normal in the Quatre-collines night.

Not one of them had even flinched.

**oOo**

"Welcome to Quatre-collines!" The two glasses into which El Juez was pouring a dark, ruby wine looked expensive enough to have stood on the King of France's own banqueting table at Versaille. But then, everything in the room spoke of unimaginable wealth.

Tall mirrors with gilded frames lined the walls, glittering with the light from dozens of solid gold candlesticks. Priceless ornaments stood sparkling on tables inlaid with rare woods and tortoise-shell, and the elegant, polished chairs were upholstered in yellow Chinese silk. A row of servants were standing along one wall, their thin faces painfully at odds with their sumptuous taffeta coats and buckled shoes, as they held plates of sweetmeats and candied fruit stiffly in front of them like statues. And on the other side of the room, curtains heavy with pearls and gold thread were looped back from the tall windows, framing the moonlit view across the harbour as if it were a painting.

Amidst all this golden magnificence, El Juez himself was a raven-like figure in black. When he passed one of the wine glasses to Elizabeth, handing it to her with a bow, it was as if all the riches in that room had been designed to be a back-drop to him.

"I must write to your father and apologise," he told her. He was of medium height, lean and graceful and supremely confident, and his long, rather handsome face was that of a man in his middle thirties - surprisingly young, when you thought about it, for an island governor about to celebrate ten years in office. But his hair was pure white, and the effect - with his black moustache and eye-brows - was startling and somehow sinister. He had very white teeth.

"I find it impossible to feel sorry for him, despite his accident," he said smoothly. "If your father were well, he would never have sent me so beautiful an ambassador in his stead."

Elizabeth merely stared at him with a stony expression. El Juez seemed quite unabashed. He turned to Will, and this time his smile glittered. "And of course, the valiant Master Turner. I crossed swords, once, with _your_ father."

"I didn't know that," Will said carefully. "Sir."

"No?" El Juez shrugged. "No... I suppose not. It was hardly an encounter Bootstrap Bill would have wanted to boast about."

Will returned his gaze steadily. "My father left England before I was born," he said. "You must forgive me if I don't recall the details of every... little scrap of a fight the man ever had."

For a long moment they faced on another. Will, uncomfortably warm in his best coat, looked into the candles reflected in his host's unreadable eyes and felt a familiar chill. The weapons, for the time being at least, were words rather than swords. It was still a duel.

El Juez smiled first. "Ah, but you and I, Master Turner, we are allies - are we not?" Without troubling to turn his head, he snapped his fingers, and at once a slave boy leapt forward to proffer his tray of fruit. Will's eyes narrowed. Under the high collar of his gold-braided coat, the child wore a broad linen stock, wound so tightly about his neck that it looked like a bandage.

"I should, of course, have been at the quayside to greet you," El Juez was continuing, "I fear I had some unfinished business to attend to. I - "

"We heard it," Elizabeth said sharply before Will could reply. It was the first time she had spoken.

El Juez bowed. "Then I apologise. I hope you were not alarmed - merely a pirate being brought to justice. But I was going to explain that I am an extremely busy man. You will forgive me if you do not see me during daylight hours tomorrow - such a great deal to organise... The Ball, of course, begins at seven." He looked at Will. "For your own safety, I must insist you do not wander out of the Palace. The cliffs and forest paths can be dangerous if you are unfamiliar with them, and I can spare no-one to act as a guide."

Will nodded. He had more or less expected this, which did not make it any less unpleasant. He and Elizabeth - and no doubt El Juez' other guests as well - were to be prisoners until after the Ball. It was only for two nights. Nevertheless, Quatre-collines was a place Will would have liked to feel he could sail out of when he wanted.

Despite himself, he felt his gaze drawn to the window. He could see the _Dauntless_ clearly from here, very small and distant on the black water, and beyond her that narrow harbour entrance, and the loom of the fort. Those guns, Will knew, were as well-placed to stop vessels leaving the anchorage as they were to keep enemies out.

Yet there had to be some way, surely? Some means by which an enterprising captain could slip out of Quatre-collines without waiting for El Juez' permission? He wondered how Jack Sparrow would do it. Then he grinned.

Captain Jack Sparrow, pirate and master of the legendary _Black Pearl_, would never be stupid enough to come here in the first place.

**oOo**

Down in the sultry, stifling heat of the harbour, the great ships moved idly with the evening tide. Apart from the rest, keeping her distance with lordly contempt, the big galleon swung at her anchorage beneath the cliffs with a kind of heavy grandeur.

There was no wind to lift the gold and crimson colours at her peak and paint them across the sky. But three great lanterns splashed light and chasing shadows across the carved vines, the dolphins and the fat little cherubs on her stern - and on her name. She was the _Maria Mercedes_, fresh out from Europe, and she carried one passenger.

The King's ambassador, on his way to treat with the Viceroy himself at Cartagena, had stopped at Quatre-collines to grace El Juez' celebrations as the Guest of Honour. It seemed incredible. He was the Duke of Casamontana, a statesman, and a nobleman of the highest standing.

But in the deep shadow of the _Mercedes_' quarterdeck, a very different figure stood slouched against the trunk of the mizzen-mast, and watched. He held a bottle of rum in one hand, and every now and then he took a swig, raising the bottle with a flourish - as if everything he did was done for the delight of an audience, whether anyone was there to see him or not. But his eyes were clear enough. They were fixed on the palace.

Earlier that afternoon, he had recognised the _Dauntless_ long before she came nosing her way carefully beneath the harbour fort. He had seen Will and Elizabeth rowed ashore. He had stood and listened to that blood-chilling howl, as some forsaken wretch El Juez called a pirate was put to death. Now, he was staring not at the palace's dozens of lighted windows, but at the handful of shadowy figures flitting along the battlements.

And his reaction to all these things was the same.

"That's interesting," he said. And he grinned a gold-toothed grin in the lantern-light.


	3. Chapter 3

"You look beautiful," said Will. It was the first time he had seen Elizabeth in the new dress she had ordered for the Ball, and the dark green silk suited her perfectly, setting off the hint of red in her hair. As always, Will felt that glow of undeserved pride at the sight of her. He himself was dressed plainly in dove-grey, a sword on his hip and a single drop pearl in one ear. But Lieutenant Kenton, waiting politely on the landing, looked like a uniformed fop beside him.

"Captain Stanbury's apologies, Ma'am," Kenton sounded anxious. "He feels he should stay with the ship. There's a storm coming."

"He's not taking her to sea?" In rough weather, the _Dauntless_ might be safer in deep water, but Will was more alarmed that he would have cared to admit at the idea of being stranded on Quatre-collines without her.

"No, Sir. It's a fine harbour - very sheltered, and the holding's good. But he wants to be aboard to deal with any emergency." Kenton lowered his voice. "Besides, too many ships have mysteriously disappeared in these waters, whatever our hosts may say about keeping the pirates in their place." He noticed Elizabeth's eye on him and blushed. "Although the _Dauntless_ would give a good account of herself, of course."

"Of course." Will, too, could feel the heaviness in the weather. He glanced at Elizabeth. "Are you nervous?"

"Certainly not!" Elizabeth tossed her head, that little show of temper telling Will everything he needed to know.

"Then, let's go."

The great Ballroom was already candle-lit and bright with colour. From the top of a short flight of stairs leading down to the dance floor, the three guests looked out across a sea of shimmering silk and powdered wigs. Cavaliers and fine ladies strolled in and out through the arched doorways from the battlements, or stood in polite groups beside the long tables heaped with gold and glittering glass. Music and conversation mingled elegantly.

At the head of the stairs, a large man in a silver wig and an expanse of blue coat was announcing the guests, rapping heavily on the floor with his brass-tipped staff as he bellowed their names:

"Representing His Excellency the Governor of Port Royal: Mister William Turner and Mistress Elizabeth Turner!" He gave them a wide, insolent grin before slamming the staff into the marble. "Lieutenant Archibald Kenton, RN!"

Ladies were not supposed to look down when navigating stairs. Elizabeth, sailing down with her head held high and a perfect faith in Will's steering, found herself nodding and even graciously smiling at the faces below as they turned to watch her. She would rather have spat in their eyes. True to his word, they had not seen El Juez all day. But they had met a few of their fellow guests, and there were others here whom Elizabeth recognised from the parties and politics of Port Royal: Admirals and island governors and the Caribbean's wealthiest planters and merchants. All of them were as spineless as her father, she decided, turning their backs on their host's chilling reputation for the sake of his power and gold.

Her smile stiffened as El Juez' elegant black coat appeared threading its way through the crowd towards them. He bowed.

"Sir," El Juez spoke to Will, dislike as thinly sheathed beneath the polite manners as a sword edge draped in silk. "You confront me with my poverty. I may own all this -" he waved carelessly at the tables of gold plates, "but yours is the finest jewel in the Americas." He kissed Elizabeth's hand, then, ignoring the glare she shot at Will, tucked it into the crook of his arm. "Please - allow me to show you the second finest."

The second finest jewel in the Americas was sitting on a small table at the end of the room, all but hidden behind the six burly men in half-armour who stood guarding it. Two carried pikes, two rested naked swords against steel-plated shoulders, and two stood square-set with arms like hams folded on their broad chests - a loaded pistol in one hand, and three more in each belt. El Juez might look and move like a fencing master himself, but he could afford to buy muscle. Behind them, the table held a display of treasure: bags of coins, untied at the neck so that the contents came spilling out beneath the candle-light, some silver ingots as thick as a man's two fingers, a swirl of necklaces. And in pride of place, nestling in the velvet lining of a polished wooden box with gold clasps... a single ruby the size of a walnut.

"I wish you to see this," said El Juez. "The 'Lagrima Colorada' - The Red Teardrop ruby. It is, of course, priceless. It was stolen by pirates from aboard one of His Majesty's own treasures ships. The dogs slaughtered every man aboard." He smiled, a flash of teeth with no warmth or humour in it. "Fortunately, my men were able to overtake the pirates responsible and recover the stone. You may tell your father this: I have an excellent record of success against the scum and filth who infest my seas. Everything you see here on this table is pirate booty - recaptured by my ships."

"But that's wonderful!" Elizabeth beamed. "Now you can return it all to its rightful owners!"

Will's mouth quirked in a sudden grin, not quite quick enough for El Juez not to see it. But Elizabeth was fanning herself innocently, her eyes wide and admiring.

"Indeed," El Juez said coldly.

Perhaps it was just as well that at that moment the next guest was announced.

**oOo**

"Representing His Majesty the King!" The blue-coated giant paused, enjoying the sensation those few words caused. Everyone craned for their first glimpse of the great man, the nobleman from the _Maria Mercedes_. "His Excellency the Ambassador, Don Carlos Diego Domingo Felipe Montoya de Monza y Esteban, Duke of Casamontana!"

Will and Elizabeth stared with all the rest.

The figure at the head of the stairs was not particularly tall, and very slim, dressed in such an enormous red coat what he looked almost like a little boy in his father's clothes. Yet he commanded attention in a way which had nothing to do with titles and kings, nor even with the _Mercedes_' guns.

His hat was the size of a cartwheel, its feather curling half-way down his back. His shirt seemed to froth lace at his neck and wrists, there was a white silk love-knot in his hair, and he wore bucket-top boots. His sword, which looked exquisite, was worn in what Will recognised as the latest French fashion - although he personally thought it flashy and rather stupid - with the blade stabbed through the pocket of his coat.

To complete the picture, he carried a pair of quizzing glasses - spectacles held up to the face on the end of a be-ribboned silver stick, through which he peered at the crowd in an affected manner.

Horrified, Elizabeth choked a gasp of shocked disbelief into a cough. She did not dare look at Will.

And down the stairs, strolling into the lair of the most ruthless pirate-taker in the Caribbean, with no more protection than a dress sword, and no better disguise than a borrowed name, came Captain Jack Sparrow.


	4. Chapter 4

_And down the stairs came Captain Jack Sparrow..._

Like Elizabeth, he tried to do it without looking. Unlike her, he tripped over his sword three steps from the bottom and stumbled into a table, sending a pyramid of chocolate-dusted oranges bowling across the dance floor. But he recovered gracefully, sauntered over to El Juez as if it were he who owned the Palace, and swept the ridiculous hat to the floor in an extravagant bow.

"Don Carlos -" El Juez began a carefully considered speech of welcome.

"Ah!" To Elizabeth's dismay and delight, Jack raised a warning finger, commanding the Governor to silence. She remembered how he had always used his hands when he talked - long-fingered swordsman's hands which this evening were festooned with rings. In the sudden, absolute quiet he produced a silver snuff-box, letting the quizzing glasses dangle from their silken ribbon about his wrist as he sniffed delicately, then fluttered a lace handkerchief like a lady-in-waiting flaunting a fan.

"This party," he said solemnly, "is the best party I've been to since I arrived in the Caribbean. It is, in fact, the only party I've been to since I arrived in the Caribbean. But I'm sure, if I had been to other parties, I'd still think that this one - was very good." He paused, beaming hopefully, until El Juez was on the point of replying - then gave a thunderous sneeze.

"We are... honoured," said El Juez.

Elizabeth glanced at him sharply. There was something in the voice. Surely El Juez, a man so determined to impress with his power that he paraded recaptured pirate booty worth a fortune in his Ballroom... surely he should have been delighted to welcome the king's ambassador - no matter how badly dressed? Yet El Juez spoke to the Duke of Casamontana with the same thinly-veiled loathing he directed at Will Turner, Port Royal blacksmith. He sneered.

"The pleasure is all yours," Jack said encouragingly. Both Turners winced. "Mine. Clearly you're a man of considerable wit and good judgment, and I shall be sure to inform His Majesty of your many qualities at the earliest opportunity, eh? Next time I'm having a beer with him, at the Palace." He leered at Elizabeth. "As for you, Love - I would like to stay and get better acquainted. Really. But I hear there's this ridiculously high-stakes card game going on in the next room, and you know what they say: Lucky at cards, unlucky in love. The way you're looking at me, Darlin', I ought to make my fortune."

He bowed again, nodded to Will, and headed for the card tables, pausing once or twice to peer at a giggling beauty through those stupid glasses - while Elizabeth fanned herself feverishly. Will looked bleak. They had both known Jack Sparrow to do some extraordinarily foolhardy things. But walking openly into Quatre-collines was lunatic even by his standards.

"Remarkable." El Juez watched him go. Then he too made his bows. "You will excuse me - I must not neglect my other guests. Do you know," he spoke lightly, "there are still some people here, guests in my house, who accuse me of signing your father's Treaty against the pirates merely for some... criminal purpose of my own? That I have even been called "pirate" myself?"

Suddenly he was looking straight at Elizabeth. "Perhaps my dealings with so... great a man as the Duke of Casamontana will change their minds. Your servant, Ma'am - Turner. I do hope you find the rest of the evening... instructive."

**oOo**

"What the Hell do you think you're doing here?" Elizabeth hissed.

The Duke of Casamontana lifted her hand in his and paced a solemn circle in time to the music, frowning as if this simple task needed his complete concentration - which it possibly did. Then he smiled the smile which, at one time or another, every woman in the pirate stronghold of Tortuga had wanted to slap. Elizabeth know exactly how they felt.

It was been Will who suggested she dance with Jack, swallowing his own fleeting jealousy to point out that she would be able to talk to him under cover of the music - to talk, and to warn him, although warn him of what exactly neither of them could have said. Any man swaggering into a colonial ballroom with the pirate brand on his fore-arm was daring Death to claim him. But Quatre-collines was different. Whatever was going on here, it went far deeper than starving slaves and a brutal approach to the piracy laws.

The trouble was that Jack knew it. Despite appearances, Jack Sparrow was very far from stupid. He had to have heard the wilder waterfront rumours about this place. He knew the risk he was taking, and, being Jack Sparrow, he was loving it. He was in no mood to listen to warnings.

He had played cards for nearly two hours. Elizabeth was left to fume and fret in the giggling flock of women and girls who fluttered like butterflies around the table, while the heap of coin at Jack's elbow climbed steadily higher, and the lies he was telling about the "Duke"'s life at Court became ever more ridiculous.

"I heard," a little red-headed girl murmured breathlessly at Elizabeth's side, "I heard he never wears the same pair of gloves twice, but has new ones made up every day from only the finest dog-skin. And he owns twelve palaces, and travels everywhere in a solid gold carriage..."

"Really?" Elizabeth had been thoroughly irritated. "Solid gold? And how many _horses_ does it take, to pull a solid gold ca- ?"

"I use elephants," Jack said calmly. "White ones." His eyes met Elizabeth's, daring her, and she saw the flicker of amused resignation, the look that sighed, "Oh, very well, if I must... I'm bored with this anyway." Then it was gone, and the Duke of Casamontana was lounging to his feet, humming something under his breath which sounded dangerously like "A pirate life, yo-ho" as he scooped his winnings into the embroidered purse on his belt.

"Gentlemen - my thanks." His tone, like his bow, carried precisely the right amount of exaggerated good manners to be considered extremely rude, and his fellow gamblers - losers all - bristled indignantly. "Ladies -"

There was a flurry of jostling for position, during which Elizabeth had her toes stamped on by a large woman in her late fifties, and Jack stroked his chin, considering.

"No... no... sorry, Love..." The fat lady was simpering shamelessly at him over the feathers of a huge purple fan, and he winced - then leaned forward to whisper in the ear of a flustered fifteen-year-old, "Elderflower wine, Love - very good for pimples." He was turning away when he stopped short with a little start of surprise, and gazed reverently through the quizzing glasses, the very picture of a man struck silent in the presence of beauty.

Then he had tweaked his moustache into vain points, and held out his hand to the suddenly crimson-faced Elizabeth...

... So now they were dancing. And he still would not answer her questions.

"How's Will?" he asked, instead. "Only, I notice you are not dancing with said beloved husband. A lover's tiff, eh?" He leaned closer. "You didn't do that thing of yours with the rum, did you?"

Elizabeth put her chin in the air. "Captain Sp-" she caught herself in time. "Don Diego -"

"Don Carlos, Darlin'." Jack paused, frowning slightly with one vast boot still in mid-air. "Don Carlos Felipe... no, Don Carlos Domingo... Domingo Felipe..."

"I am trying to save your life!" Elizabeth whispered fiercely. "You were aboard the _Maria Mercedes_ last night. Very well, then - you heard those screams. That, Don Whatever-your-name-is, was El Juez executing a pirate. You are in the deadliest danger every second that you remain on this island, and if your vain... stupid... _swaggering_ self-conceit will not let you listen to reason -"

Jack had been following this whispered outburst with a solemn expression - laughing at her, she knew. But now his eyes widened in surprise, not at Elizabeth but at something behind her.

"Ready about, Love!" He gripped her arms and swung her sharply around, so that Elizabeth was now facing into the room - and he had his back to it. "I'm having an idea here," he said across her blossoming protests. "Why don't you and I go for a romantic stroll on the battlements. Eh?"

Elizabeth smiled weakly at the other couples in their set, now waiting with bemused good manners for them to continue the dance. For a man in disguise - and peril of his life - the Duke of Casamontana has an unenviable flair for attracting attention. She tried to side-step him, but again he moved deftly in front of her, still keeping his back to the room at large. "Why?" she asked.

Jack hesitated, trapped. Then he put his lips close to her ear. "The young lady in the blue dress is Sophie de Vauban, alright?" He spoke in the flat, bored tone Elizabeth had heard before, when he did not want to explain himself but could no longer see how to avoid it. "About four months ago, the _Black Pearl_ captured the ship she was a passenger on, and I held the delightful Miss de Vauban to ransom for twelve thousand pieces of eight. Savvy?"

"For Goodness' sake!" Elizabeth stepped back, her eyes cold. Around them, the dance moved on - although she was aware of the scandal they had just caused, the Duke of Casamontana with his face buried in her hair in the middle of the dance-floor. It was not that which had enraged her. "This Ball is being attended by more than two hundred of the most powerful people in the Caribbean," she said icily. "Merchants, naval officers, governors. The very people most likely to become your victims -"

Jack winced. "Suppliers of goods, Darlin'."

" - who spend their lives hunting you down, and sit in judgment on you once you're caught. Did you really think it was likely none of them would recognise you?" She clutched half-heartedly at a straw. "I suppose she _will_ recognise you?"

"Even in the dark, Love."

Elizabeth met his gaze steadily. Then she sighed, and offered her arm. She was suddenly weary. Angry, yes, and frightened for this man whose arrogance and swaggering vanity infuriated her all the more because she did like him. But above all, bone weary. "Jack," she tried again. "Why are you here?"

For a moment the dark eyes looked hurt, as if she had insulted him by not working it out already. "I intend to steal the Red Teardrop Ruby," he said.

**oOo**

Will watched the dancers from the shadows of one of the great, arched doorways. Elizabeth, he thought, looked lovelier than ever. Even hampered by Jack, whose cat-like grace as a swordsman seemed to desert him completely on the dance-floor, she floated on the music like a green silk petal on a summer breeze, and Will would never have tired of watching her.

All the same, he was deeply uneasy. He told himself he was being foolish, flinching at shadows. But the fact remained that something was very wrong here, and for Will, quiet and alone at the edge of the crowd, there was a fleeting moment when he could almost see it - as if the Evil itself were a live thing, coiled and waiting beneath the bright colours of the Ball like the gathering storm on the moonlit night outside.

Nor was he any happier about the new dancers who were appearing as the night deepened. The giant in the blue coat had announced no new names. Yet thin-faced young men in El Juez' pale uniform were drifting silently amongst the other guests. Gauntly beautiful girl, their white dresses floating about them like mist, could be seen in frozen glimpses through the crowd, only to vanish again whenever he looked twice.

Will stood awkwardly in the doorway, smiling and nodding at the passers-by, and all the while his knuckles were white about the hilt of his dress sword.

He was watching Elizabeth glide dream-like at Jack's side - even at this distance he could tell she was simmering - when he heard the noise.

The Ballroom was becoming rowdy, the atmosphere stifling. But by a trick of the echoes, the vaulted passageway at Will's back seemed quiet and still. A slight chill came from the stonework, faintly clammy in the warm night, and the second-hand candlelight which spilt out from the Ballroom was quickly swallowed in the shadows of a torchless staircase. Will cocked his head, straining to hear. For a moment he thought his imagination had got the better of him. Then he heard it again. Not crying exactly, but a single, despairing sob. The kind of noise a man might blurt out in spite of himself towards the end of a long fight, if he were desperate, and exhausted, and angry at his own betraying weakness - and losing. It came from the stairs.

Will Turner moved backwards, into the dark.

Then he slid his sword from its scabbard, and took the stone steps at a run.

**oOo**

**Author's Note.** _ Yep, shout-out in this scene for the epic Burt Lancaster film "The Crimson Pirate" - and thanks to Kia and Smithy for your kind reviews. Hope you're still enjoying it. ~Selkie. _


	5. Chapter 5

It was like a scene from a painting. Moonlight streamed from a tall window, stretching thin shadows like fingers the length of the flag-stoned landing. And caught in its beam, two of those pale dancers from the Ballroom below - a young man and a girl - stood staring back at Will with snake-like eyes. Between them, held fast but still squirming to escape, was a boy.

He was ten years old, perhaps twelve, a scrawny waif in the heavy golden coat of El Juez' house slaves. One appalled glance showed Will the torn collar, the scratches on his neck as the girl dragged his head back by the hair. He was one of the few servants Will had seen who did not wear that thick linen stock like a bandage round his throat. Yet. Then the young man gave a hiss. "Get out!"

"Let him go!" Will said sharply.

The girl laughed. She had not taken her eyes from Will, even as her partner was glancing furtively past him, cocking his head to listen -

"This is none of your business, Smith," the man said. "Go back to your dancing."

Will shook his head. If he was surprised that they knew who he was, he did not show it. He stood lightly _en garde_, letting the point of his sword flicker from one to the other of them. "Let him go."

The girl's laughter died abruptly. She dropped the boy, letting him slump heavily on his knees on the stone floor - and the boy, for all that must have hurt him, was back on his feet in an instant, darting for the stairwell with one awed glance at Will as he went, the rags of his collar clutched tight beneath his chin with both hands. Will tensed, expecting the young man to draw his sword.

But it was the girl who moved, leaning forward in a gesture full of menace and deadly allure, to stare boldly into Will's face. Will's own collar felt suddenly tight. She was studying him as if he were goods for sale, making no secret of the fact that she was calculating his value; and she was undeniably beautiful. As a venomous jewelled snake is beautiful, or the gleam of poison on an assassin's knife. When she smiled, it was slow and deliberate, blue-edged lips peeling back to show her eye-teeth sharpened to fangs like white daggers in the moonlight. "My friend told you to leave," she whispered.

"Luisa - " the young man's voice held a warning. "Remember - "

Luisa shrugged. Still moving with that studied grace, she held up one long-nailed finger between Will's face and hers, and eased the ring from it with her teeth. Then she flipped the ring into the air and it spun upwards, black and tumbling silver -

There was a shimmer of speed. Suddenly, Will was standing stock-still, the point of the young man's sword in Luisa's hand quivering half an inch from his throat. Dear Lord, she had grabbed it from the man's belt, and Will had not even seen her move. The ring clattered tinnily to a rest, impaled in mid-air on the lunging blade as neatly as a thrown hoop about a cane at a St Bartholomew's Day fair.

"So leave," purred Luisa.

**oOo**

Far out to sea, lightning flickered. As yet, no growl of thunder reached the island. But Jack Sparrow paused where he was walking with his arm about Elizabeth's shoulders on the walls of the palace, and watched the horizon for a moment as warily as he might have watched a row of enemy gun-ports.

Elizabeth followed his gaze.

Where they stood, the battlements had been lavishly transformed into a kind of roof-top garden, with statues and heavily perfumed shrubs in pots. Long carpets had been rolled out through the arches from the Ballroom, making pathways beneath the branches where couples could wander in the sweet-scented moonlight. But along the seaward rampart a sheer wall plummeted seventy feet to the rocky hillside, and Elizabeth could look down across the sloping tree-tops to the harbour. It was very still.

"You needn't worry about your precious _Maria Mercedes_," she said coldly, slapping his hand away for what felt like the sixth or seventh time from her bare shoulder. "This is a particularly well-sheltered anchorage. Besides, we both know you stole her."

"You're absolutely right, Love." Jack lifted the glass or rum punch in his spare hand in an admiring toast. "Unless of course it wasn't the _Maria Mercedes_ I was worrying about."

"The - _Pearl_?" Elizabeth considered that. It made a sort of sense. Not even Jack Sparrow would have been rash enough to sail into Quatre-collines aboard the _Black Pearl_ - a vessel as notorious as she was recognisable, and one which would have stood out amongst the local island shipping in the harbour like an albatross on a village duck-pond. But against that, the _Pearl_ was the only thing Jack had ever loved. Her loss in a mutiny had cut him deeply, and it had taken ten years and much shedding of blood - not all of it other people's - for him to win her back. He would not lightly be parted from her again: wherever Jack was, the _Black Pearl_, lovely, deadly and sought-after, would not be far away.

Elizabeth found herself scanning the ocean, as if she expected to see the rakish silhouette loom up there and then beyond the harbour fort. "Mr Gibbs and the others? They're out there - in that?" she half-whispered.

Jack appeared not to have heard. "'S funny thing," he said indistinctly through a mouthful of pineapple. "Here's El Juez, eh? Finest harbour in five hundred miles, all those ships at sea, harassing jolly pirates, a big storm coming - and not one of them runs for home, and a peaceful berth. Strange world, innit?"

He was watching her archly over the rim of the glass, and Elizabeth dragged her mind back from the _Black Pearl_. "That harbour," she pointed out, "is a forest of masts."

"None of them his, Love. A couple of the schooners, maybe, and the fishing smacks. All the real tonnage down there belongs to your friends in the Ballroom."

"El Juez has ships." Elizabeth struggled free of his arm and swung to face him, her expression earnest. "I don't know what you're plotting, but if your plan relies on some lunatic notion that El Juez doesn't have the sea-power to come after you, you'd best abandon it. He ran down the pirates who stole the Tear-drop in the first place. His -"

"Pirates didn't steal the Red Tear-drop Ruby." Jack leaned closer, his face only inches from hers. She could see the distant lightning flashes reflected in his eyes. "We tried, Love, alright? We knew what ship it was on, and we were giving chase, hull-down off this very island." He shrugged theatrically. "Just after midnight, we lost the wind. We ran out the sweeps, but by the time we'd pulled up to her, it was first light. She was drifting, Love. Someone had boarded her in the dark, cut the steering, ransacked the hold - and spirited away your Red Tear-drop Ruby. I swear, there wasn't another sail in sight."

Elizabeth shivered. Despite Jack's apparent boredom with his own story, the image was a powerful one: the two ships alone on a glassy sea, the only sound the creak of the _Pearl_'s long sweeps as she inched towards her silent prey. "And... the crew?"

"Dead." Solemn again, Jack pulled at his collar, baring his throat in a gesture more eloquent than any words. "Drained. Not a drop of blood left in their bodies, Darlin'. Savvy?"


	6. Chapter 6

Will lifted his chin. He could feel the wickedness now, crowding into the room - the darkest of the rumours about Quatre-collines made pale flesh before him, and the shadows rising at his back. And he was damned if he'd be afraid of it. The old, disdainful fighting half-smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"Luisa!" The young man said again, more urgently this time. But only the girl mattered now. Will touched his drawn sword to hers, feeling the thrill of malice in the steel, and knew as her mocking eyes narrowed in sudden hunger that this would be a fight to the death.

And then, just as clearly, he knew that it would not.

Luisa was backing away, wiping her hand across her mouth. The young man had vanished. And now even Will could hear what it was that had alarmed them - the steady footfalls of a man climbing the stairs.

Luisa had reached the window. For a moment she paused there, cornered, a wild-cat figure spitting hatred with her back to a threatening sky, and Will could not help but take a step towards her, one hand out-stretched as she let herself fall backwards into the night -

"No!" He rushed forward, leaning as far as he dared through the open window, expecting to see the body on the rocky slopes below...

... And took a deep breath, steadying himself with one hand against the stonework. The hillside was empty. The girl, Luisa, had gone.

"I think I had better show you back to the Ballroom, Mister Turner," El Juez said politely from the top of the stairs. "You will remember that I warned you not to get lost. You almost were."

**oOo**

"And that's why you're here? For the Ruby?" Elizabeth was unreasonably, even childishly, disappointed. In her heart, she had been hoping there was a nobler reason for Jack's presence - that he had come to rescue a captured shipmate, perhaps, or for the love of a beautiful woman. But no. At that moment she despised him as thoroughly as she had ever done. "You'd risk your freedom, your life, maybe even whatever passes for your soul, just for some..." she spat the word, " - treasure?"

Jack spread his hands. "Pirate!" he said.

"You Sir!"

They sprang apart. A man was striding self-importantly towards them through the shrubbery, and Jack sighed. Although the battlements were deserted, he stepped carefully away from the still fuming Elizabeth and made a show of looking over each shoulder in turn. His hands hovered in an exaggerated, "Who, me?" gesture - although all that really meant was that they were closer to his sword-belt.

"Yes, you, Sir!" The new-comer was red-faced with wine and indignation - and also because his collar was too tight. He was a big man, but with muscle rather than fat, crammed into the straining uniform of a major in one of the West Indies foot regiments, and he towered over Jack Sparrow like a prize bull over the farmyard cockerel. An impression heightened by the way he was breathing heavily through his nose. "You're a damnable cheat, Sir, and I demand reparation."

"Eh?" Jack looked him up and down. "You'll have to remind me."

"By God, Sir!" The Major spluttered with rage, and Elizabeth - who until that moment had been been afraid he had somehow overheard them talking about the Ruby - had a sudden foreboding. Sure enough, he whipped a crumpled playing card from his pocket and flourished it in Jack's face. "Marked cards, Sir! I had the damned misfortune to play a hand with you an hour since. Four hundred guineas, Sir! And this was found under your chair when you'd left." He ripped the card in half length-ways and flung the pieces to the ground. "D'you have the effrontery to tell me you knew nothing about it?"

"Oh." Jack Sparrow gazed solemnly down at the broken features of the knave of diamonds on the flagstones at his feet. "That."

He was turning away, but the Major shot out a beefy hand and caught him by the shoulder, dragging him round. "You will not turn your back on me, Sir."

"It's not worth you getting killed over," said Jack. His eyes had that thoughtful look, and Elizabeth, who had heard the provoking drawl in his voice before, said sharply,

"Stop it!" She could hardly believe he would be mad enough to cross swords here, on the roof garden at El Juez' Ball, where he was supposed to be the King's ambassador.

"Your concern does you little credit, ma'am," huffed the Major. "As for you, Sir, you are a coward as well as a cheat, and you need not suppose you can escape me by skulking behind the petticoats of another man's wife..."

"I suggest you leave Mistress Turner out of this, Mate."

Elizabeth winced. There was no going back when Jack spoke in that tone, with no trace of mockery or boredom. But the Major was drunk enough not to notice, pressing pompously on with his speech.

"... I came out here to demand my guineas - and an apology. But you have insulted me, Sir, and I am obliged to seek satisfaction. I'll be damned now if I'll accept anything else from you, but your sword."

"Best not disappoint you then, eh?" said Jack Sparrow, as his own hand dropped to his hilt.

**oOo**

"I want Turner." Luisa's voice was a snarl, her face etched with sharp hunger and sullen, smarting pride. She flung out a hand to indicate the slaves who stood like dull beasts against the wall, clutching their branched silver candlesticks. "I'm sick of these sheep."

"Then contain yourself," El Juez said coldly. "Your lack of control disgusts me. If it happens again, you'll be burned."

His eyes swept the room. There were a dozen of them, young men and girls in white clothing, watching him warily like a ring of half-tamed dogs. And although he was pleased, he was not in the least surprised when every one of them quailed. They were his hounds, their pale, angular faces caught between greed for whatever he might fling them, and a cringing fear of the whip.

Only Luisa gave him back look for look. "You can taste their emotions. Turner's brave. All you get from the peasants is a kind of numbness. They're not even properly frightened any more."

"When I require instruction as to a vampire's feeding habits, I will ask for it."

She held his gaze a moment longer before she bowed. Two red spots showed high on her cheekbones, and El Juez knew he had been right. He would soon have to deal with Luisa. For now he let the silence drag out. Faintly from the Ballroom came the strains of a minuet. A moth fizzled briefly as it blundered into a candle flame.

When he spoke again his voice was quiet and chill, each word falling into place like the click of a pistol being cocked. "Understand this. One day William Turner's rash good nature will carry him too far, so that the Port Royal government will be forced to disown him. When that day comes I personally will tear out his throat. But until it comes - You Will Not Touch Turner."

Suddenly he pounced. One long-fingered hand siezed the nearest slave by the chin and turned her face this way and that in the candlelight. The girl was right. There was no fight left in the eyes which stared listlessly back at his, and his mouth quirked in distaste as he let her go.

"This Treaty with Port Royal will bring us the freedom of the seas, to prey on pirates. Pirates! - not honest fools. Mortals almost as wicked as we are." They grinned at that, wide and savage - here among their own kind, with none but the cowed slaves to see them, no-one was troubling to hide their fangs. "You can hunt them and take them, you can drink to the death from them, and the Royal Navy will call you heroes for doing it! For tonight - keep it in check. Before sunrise, I promise you'll have fed - and on better meat than that government lickspittle. And before the moon turns we will have left this damned rock and the whole of the Caribbean will be our feast. But we need Port Royal's friendship. I will not risk losing it because you," he told Luisa, "want your teeth in the Governor's pretty son-in-law."

"What if I showed you a way we could have both?" Luisa asked him.

The rest of the pack were watching them intently, mouths hanging open like dogs indeed, but here and there the grins had become wary. Those standing closest to Luisa began to shift casually away.

- And then the grins froze, as every one of El Juez' hounds cocked their heads to listen. The music from the Ballroom had faltered, then ceased. In its place came startled shrieks and the noise of many people blundering to get out of the way. And faint but clear amidst the commotion, the unmistakable clatter of swords.

El Juez's needle smile gleamed sharper than any. "Later," he suggested. "They've started. Shall we go and join in?"


	7. Chapter 7

Steel leaped and flickered like lightning as Jack Sparrow drove his opponent backwards along the strip of carpet beneath the cloying-scented trees. The Major was parrying grimly. He was a strong man, and even now his flushed face showed not so much fear as outrage, that this strutting aristocrat with his quizzing glasses and his ridiculous hat should dare to be the better swordsman. But he was giving ground - and now they were gliding in through the vaulted archway and into the Ballroom, the blades darting between them too quickly for the eye to follow.

There was instant chaos.

The dancers scattered. Men swore, women screamed - and Elizabeth, scurrying anxiously in the fencers' wake, thought that a good number of those shrill ladies were squealing with excitement rather than alarm. Not all of them. Just for a second she caught sight of Sophie de Vauban, Jack's former hostage in the blue dress, her face the colour of soured milk as she stood stricken with both hands pressed to her mouth.

But there was no time to wonder about that. Next moment a hand grabbed Elizabeth's own arm, and she yelped in surprise.

"You're leaving," Will said. He too looked pale, his eyes hard and determined. "You're returning to the ship with Kenton. Now."

Elizabeth thought this high-handed. "Oh, indeed?" Her eye-brows arched upwards. "And may I ask what _you_ will be doing?"

"I'll follow. I have to talk to Jack, first."

They looked at Jack.

The crowd had not fled very far. They had fallen back on either side, so that the swordsmen were fighting back and forth along a corridor of buzzing spectators, and Will saw white uniforms, too, making no move to stop the fight. But the Major had nowhere left to go.

There was a shout as the backs of his legs collided with the edge of a long table. Then he was sprawling, rolling clumsily backwards in a clatter of broken crockery to come up struggling on the far side with his parade-ground uniform splattered in grease and mangoes. Jack leaped onto the table and rained glittering blows about his head, his expression his usual one of detached curiosity, while the Major sweated and gasped in desperation.

Suddenly it was all over. Blue sparks snapped from the steel as the blades grated together - and Jack's wrist snaked forward with a murderous little twist and a flick which sent the Major's sword spinning from his hand. The Major was still gaping after it like a landed fish, quite unable to accept that he had been disarmed, when Jack placed the point of his own sword very carefully against the man's heaving breast-bone, and sneered. No-one in the Americas could sneer quite like Captain Jack Sparrow.

"Shall we say Honour is satisified?" he suggested.

"Come, Gentlemen, that's enough," said El Juez.

He was standing on the stairs, a few feet up from the bottom - a lean, sinister figure in black, save only where the candlelight shed gold flecks in his pure white hair - and he was no longer smiling. One hand rested in a casual threat on the butt of a long-barreled pistol tucked into his belt. And although he spoke quietly, his voice carried across the room like a shout, causing every head in the crowd to turn his way. Only Jack and the still panting Major kept their eyes on one another.

Then Jack shrugged. He flicked the Major a sarcastic salute, jumped lightly down from the table - athletic and graceful and only fleetingly embarrassed when he trod in the flower arrangement - and turned to face El Juez, sheathing his sword as he did so.

Elizabeth breathed out slowly, sensing Will start to relax at her side. When she looked at him she was shocked, and a little frightened, to see his hand on the hilt of his own sword.

But neither of them really saw what happened next.

For Will, his swordsman's reflexes still on edge, it was just as it had been earlier with the creature Luisa. There was a kind of a blur. For less than a heart-beat the candlelight seemed to shimmer like a single ripple on the surface of a pond... And Will was aware of a pale young woman settling herself into the front rank of the crowd, almost as if she had just darted forward towards the Major, there and back again in the blink of an eye, and was now returning to her place. Elizabeth saw only that there was a pistol on the table beside the Major's right hand, where she would have sworn there had not been a pistol before.

If there had been, Jack would never have turned his back.

She grabbed Will's arm and hung on as he reached for his sword - and the Major snatched up the gun.

Everyone saw the flash of the priming and smelt the blue curling smoke. Everyone saw the Duke of Casamontana hurl himself frantically to one side - so that the bullet aimed squarely between his shoulder blades ripped instead through his right arm.

And in the slowed, drawn out second between those two, the flash and the bullet, the priming and the charge, everyone heard Sophie de Vauban's clear, high scream of warning: "JACK!"

**oOo**

"Here -" an elderly gentleman near the front of the crowd was the first to speak, his voice loud in bewilderment. All four of his chins wobbled indignantly. "I thought the feller's name was Don Domingo."

Jack rolled his eyes. "Carlos," he muttered. "Don Carlos Diego -"

No-one was listening. As one, they were gazing aghast at his arm, and Jack, following the fascinated stares, looked down. His blood was forming a thickening pool on the carpet, but that was the least of his problems. Much worse, he was clutching at the wound with his good hand, and in doing so he had unknowingly pulled at his sleeve. The lacy cuff was dragged back from his wrist, laying bare for all to see the puckered, disfiguring scar of the branding iron on his tanned skin. P for Pirate.

"Ah," said Jack.

Will took one wild pace forward and was pulled up short with Elizabeth still clinging to his arm. At the same time, the man at Sophie de Vauban's side gave a bellow of anguished understanding. "Jack? Jack _Sparrow _?!" He pointed a thick, hairy finger. "That damned pirate abducted my wife!"

And the uproar started. Sophie let out a wail of despair and buried her face in her hands, her shoulders heaving with noisy, blubbering sobs. All around her, people were shouting:

"Sparrow? Why, he's the scoundrel that stole the garrison pay-chests! Aye, blew up the strong-room doors!"

"The devil with your doors, Sir - he blew up _my_ frigate!"

"Thief!"

"Cheat!" - that was the red-faced Major, brave again now that he had a table and a dozen angry people between him and a wounded Jack Sparrow.

"Pirate!"

For once El Juez had to raise his voice to make himself heard above the din. "Take him," he said, and a dozen white uniforms and a handful of the burly, mortal men-at-arms moved forward to obey.

Jack bowed.

When he straightened up, it was with the edges of the long, narrow carpet gripped tight in both hands. "This day," he said gravely, "is a day you will always remember... except that in fact, it is, of course... a night..." The nearest men-at-arms were only yards away from him, advancing with crossed pikes to seal off his escape, and he paused, apparently thoughtful. Then he ran.

There were guards behind him, also. Jack ducked under the pikes, gave the carpet a savage jerk which sent it billowing upwards to smack the pikemen in the face, and sprinted for the archway. Shots splattered into the stonework. But he was through, tearing along the battlements with the folded-over carpet rippling behind him like some great snake. He reached the parapet and launched himself, yelling madly, over the edge.

The carpet surged after him. One of the guards, who had chosen that moment to fling himself on top of it, was dragged on his belly before losing his grip and rolling head first into the fountain. Then the last few yards were slithering rapidly over the wall. The carpet poured into the bottomless darkness -

- and stopped, jerked to a standstill by the weight of the potted shrub on its seaward end.

Jack's shoulders were all but wrenched from their sockets. He yelled again, unable to hold on with his wounded arm, and then he was dangling one-handed, in almost total blackness. How much further he had to drop, onto the murderous rocks and tree-stumps of the hillside below, the devil only knew. The storm was directly over the island now, and heavy clouds were smothering the moon. But above him, the carpet creaked ominously.

Jack reached out slowly, wincing as he groped in the dark for the nearby cliff-face.

Next moment, the thunder exploded overhead, and a stab of lightning showed him the pale figure of the vampire Luisa, floating gleefully in mid-air at his side.

The rain came at last, hard and relentless as she drew Jack's own sword as he dangled, and began to cut through the carpet.

**oOo**

There was a flutter of applause when two guards hauled Jack Sparrow, bleeding and bedraggled, across the crowded dance-floor to stand before El Juez.

The governor had not moved from his vantage point on the stairs. He was still poised, head and shoulders above everyone else, on the second step from the bottom, but now he was tossing the Red Teardrop Ruby idly in one narrow hand. The red spark at the heart of the stone winked, pin-prick sharp and captivating, drawing the eyes of all present as it caught the light.

Or, of all save one. Having turned Jack over to a couple of the hired mortal bullies at the foot of the fortress wall, Luisa was lolling carelessly in the background. Despite the rain, falling in torrents now behind the hastily-shuttered windows - and unlike Jack, who was soaked to the bone - she appeared perfectly dry. She was staring with steadfast attention at Will Turner.

"The Red Teardrop," El Juez said calmly. "I assume this _is_ what you came for? I can certainly understand why a thieving dog such as yourself would wish to steal it." Jack looked modest. "What I can not understand is how you imagined, even for one rum-deluded moment, that you could succeed."

Jack was a mess. His hat was gone, his stolen finery in sodden ribbons, and the men holding him - both much taller than he was - were twisting his arms so tightly behind his back that he was standing on tip-toe. Nevertheless, his expression as he leered up at El Juez was one of pity. "She already _told_ you, Mate." He jerked his head at the distraught Sophie. "I'm Captain Jack Sparrow."

"You're carrion." El Juez' hand lashed out, slamming into the side of Jack's face with such force that he staggered and almost fell. He shook his head, dazedly aware of Will shouting clear and keen and righteous in the distance. Jack grimaced. And stupid.

"As representative of the Governor of Port Royal, I demand that this man be brought to trial before the proper authorities!"

"Will, no!" Elizabeth said sharply. Luisa gave a laugh of pure, vicious delight - and El Juez lifted an eyebrow in well-bred surprise.

"But this is Quatre-collines," he said. "The only proper authority on this island is mine." He let his gaze travel from Will to Jack and back again. "My people have just apprehended the most wanted pirate in the Caribbean. I fail to see why I should hand him over to Port Royal - a place from whose... authority he has escaped not once, but twice already. You of all people, Mister Turner, can need no reminding of the circumstances."

There was a murmur from the other guests as this sank in. Elizabeth found she was clenching her fists, so tightly that her nails left half-moon dents in the palms of her hands. Her father had pardoned Will. He had done nothing of which he need be ashamed. Nothing.

"By God, Sir!" A colonel of Marines spoke loudly to the powdered civilian at his side. "D'ye tell me ye don't remember? Swann's son-in-law, man! He was hand-in-glove with the rogue Sparrow over that affair with the _Interceptor_ - cut her out from Port Royal under the Commodore's very nose." He peered at Will as if seeing him for the first time. "Why, the feller's nothing but a bally pirate."

"He's retired," Jack said generously.

"As you will wish you were." El Juez nodded at the guards. "Take him away."

**oOo**

**Author's Note. **_Thank you Everyone for the reviews. This was a tricky one to write - I could see the business with the carpet so clearly in my head but it was hard to describe. Well, the lads are in it now... or at least, Jack is. Whether Elizabeth can keep Will's head above water remains to be seen...  
_


	8. Chapter 8

Elizabeth stalked the deck of the _Dauntless_' great cabin, her fingers twisting distractedly in the folds of her new green dress. Beyond the salt-encrusted windows, the sea was sullen and dark. Waves slopped heavily against the hull, their white-caps grubby in the light of the stern lanterns, while overhead the rain and driven spray together scudded across the deck.

It had been a lively pull from the shore. Yet it was not for nothing that Quatre-collines was known as a good anchorage, and if the weather in the harbour was choppy, outside it was a tempest. The stifling blackness had gone now, shredded before a keening wind, and in the flying moments when the moon blew free of the clouds, Elizabeth could see a wall of white across the harbour entrance, a towering, plunging line of breakers which loomed above the headlands on either side.

She shivered, remembering Jack's quickly-hidden show of concern, and her own conviction that the _Black Pearl_ was at sea.

"You're cold." Will sat hunched on the edge of the bunk, his elbows on his knees. He was staring at the deck and did not look up. It would do no good to speak of it, but both of them were listening for a scream.

"I'm fine."

Outside, the wind howled like a wolf in a trap and Will said with quiet resolution, "I have to go back. I have to get him out."

"No!" Elizabeth swung round. In the candle-light her fine-boned features were shadowed and gaunt. Though Will couldn't know it, she looked far more frightened, now, than she had on the battlements when Jack spoke of the bloodless dead, and he forced a smile, his voice suddenly gentle.

"You were the one who said it would be exciting."

"And you said it was evil! You said you wouldn't be happy til we were leaving and now you want to go back - "

"Til we were all leaving," Will reminded her. "I have to try, Sweetheart. It's Jack. I know he's..." he groped for a word, then shrugged: " - annoying ... "

"He's a thieving arrogant heartless buccaneer who never cared for anyone or anything but himself and his own lying legend!"

"Well, yes," said Will fairly. "He's Jack. But you wouldn't want him dead."

"I don't want him dead." They were facing one another now across the cabin, the shadows leaping darkly between them. "But- but you heard them, in the Ballroom. If you go after him now, everyone will think that _you_'re a pirate. That would be unbearable..."

"And that's why you stopped me throwing my sword at the major?" Will said slowly. "Because the Governor's Daughter was ashamed... of a pirate?"

The moment the words were out of his mouth he would have recalled them, if he could. The look on her face was like a dagger blow.

"Elizabeth - "

"Actually," she said, "I was afraid for you. If you were accused of piracy in front of all those people, I don't think my father would even try to save you. It's not about rescuing his daughter this time. It's about a grubby little cut-throat who tried to steal the Red Tear-drop Ruby. And he wouldn't believe you about the - the vampires. You know as well as I do that he's afraid to remember what really happened with Barbosa, even - and he was there!" She was holding her own fear in check, wearing this chill, reasoning anger to cover it like the ice on dark water. "I - I like Jack. I really do. But I love _you_. And you said yourself that one of them wanted ... to kill you?"

The last words came out as a question, because really Will had not been very clear at all about his encounter with that one particular vampire. The female. She turned away from him as he rose to his feet, one hand held out towards her. Staring instead at the rain-streaked darkness outside the window, she said dully, "Anyway, you don't even know where they're holding him... Will!"

She was suddenly intent, peering into the dirty circle of light thrown by the Dauntless' stern lanterns - and something in her changed voice made Will drop his hand with no questions asked to his sword-hilt. "Will - there's somebody climbing up the side!"

The growing quarrel was... not forgotten. Neither of them was foolish enough to think that, with Jack still a prisoner and nothing decided. But this new threat pushed it aside, and Will caught himself actually welcoming the diversion as he stepped soundlessly into the shadow of the sail-cloth curtains, drawn sword at the ready. Elizabeth reached for a candle-stick.

It seemed a very long time before the latch rattled, and then every candle in the cabin guttered wildly, streaming sideways as the window was pushed inwards. A thin arm appeared cautiously over the sill, to be followed a moment later by a rain-draggled head. The intruder glanced furtively about the cabin, his eyes widening at the sight of Elizabeth with candle-stick raised.

"Parley?" he squeaked.


End file.
